I'm sure that many of you thought that this blog had turned into a running blog, and when I stopped blogging, it was probably because I had stopped running. While my training became a little less consistent since my last post, I continued to run. The reason I didn't post was because a lot of people were eulogizing Kyle on their blogs, and I kind of thought I should do the same. If I were going to do that though, I couldn't post about other trivial things. But there was also a big part of me that didn't want to use this space to "send Kyle off". I'm not entirely sury why, but I think that maybe I feel that stories about Kyle deserve to be told face to face. I don't know; it doesn't bother me to read other people's blogs about Kyle, but I just couldn't bring myself to do it. Thus, the very long gap in blogging.
But now, I've accomplished the task that turned this thing into a runner's diary to begin with. I ran the half marathon on Sunday. My gun time was 2:51, my chip time was 2:47, and my Garmin Forerunner 301 GPS watch time was 2:43. The reason for the discrepancy is two-fold. The chip couldn't tell that I had to wait in line to use the restroom around mile 2. I was able to pause the timer on my watch during that time. Also, I actually covered the 13.1 miles prior to crossing the finish line due to lateral movement on the road. I did break down into a walk a couple of times, but I was able to jog the last mile, and my overall pace was 12:28/mile, just under the 12:30/mile that I was hoping for, though finishing was more important than finishing fast. Don ran with me for the first couple miles, but I was holding him back, so he went on ahead. The guy who won the marathon passed me when I hit mile 10. He was on mile 23. It was pretty cold the day before the race, so I got a long-sleeve UnderArmour shirt that helps keep you warm without getting weighed down with sweat. I highly recommend that. It helped me stay just the right temperature throughout the race. The two things that slowed me down in the race were some pretty nasty blisters that I got for the first time last weekend while training and the uphill portions of the race. The hills weren't terrible, but I trained on perfectly level terrain. Two days after the race, my calves are the only things that are sore. Hopefully, I'll be back to normal by tomorrow.
So, now that it's over, will I run again? A half marathon? A whole marathon? At all? Well, I'm going to take this week off. In fact, maybe a week and a half, as Jen Lake will be out here visiting Fri-Wed. Then, I'm going to change my runs to shorter, faster runs. I'm thinking of working for six weeks on speeding up my 3-mile pace. Then, maybe I'll look for a 5K or something.